Spring planting

You know, I always tried to restrain myself from too much "crop update"-style posts where I just listed everything that was happening in the garden - but in reality,  I just went back and read the late-May posts for the last two years, and it was really cool.   I really like having photographic evidence of what I have done each year, and feeling like I have some kind of record of the seasons.   For example, yes, this week it is rainy and not the warmest, but it seems like its been a whole lot warmer than it was in past years.  I already have tomatoes and eggplants in the ground, and my lettuce is straight-up edible size.

Also, although I notice that each year I do resolve to "tone it down," as of last May I was still calling for a "no ground left uncovered policy."   If I continue reading into June, however, I see all my frustration: peas that were just starting to bloom when it was time to plant the cucumbers, lettuce that was still producing (and stealing growing time) when I needed to plant the eggplant, etc.

This year I'm not only trying to "plant within my wants" (meaning planting only the things that we will truly eat and want), I"m also refining  from last year - no bean teepee, more eggplants, more arugula, no broccoli (which I don't think I could say no to last year!).   Furthermore, I'm also continuing to plant "within my means" - which means doing the work that feels right, not what "must be done."

Restraint.


So recently I say to my girlfriend, "I think this year I'm going to take it easy, you know, try to hold back a little and not go overboard with the garden,"  thinking, of course, that she'll understand my urge toward personal growth and maturity in this hobby of mine.

Lettuce seedlings - planted a healthy distance apart.   

Her reaction?   To fall off her chair laughing.   She starts trying to hide it, but she can't and it goes from giggles to chuckles to all-out uncontrollable laughter.   I really, honestly can't figure out what's so funny....at first.    Then she wipes her eyes and looks at me and says, "I'm sorry. I really am.   It's just that we've been doing this for five years.  And you've said  that ever year."

Sigh.   Maybe if some you are gardeners, you will understand.  It's a teensy bit addictive, you know, and sometimes it's really easy to "accidentally" bring home "extra" tomatoes, herbs, seeds, bulbs or whatever from the garden store.  (Barbara Kingsolver's husband, upon seeing her dog-eared and marked-up seed catalog, said, "why don't you just circle the ones you don't want?").   But apparently, not only am I easily enticed to overdo it in the garden, worse, I've known it and been resolving to cut back since year one.

June - and Companion planting

So....for me, the art of urban gardening is doing a lot with a little space.    Or rather, cramming in lots, and lots and lots of vegetables (often too many, really) into my backyard.  (and my front yard). There's a part of me that loves the engineering challenge of how to squeeze everything in, and get a full season's harvest out of a very small plot.  One way to "double up" your space is to think seasonally - many plants that love the cold can share space with warmer-weather plants.  Here are some of my tips n' hints for packin' it in in the transition-season of June.   (PS: check out the June 1 post to see how each of these plots looked when I started them in May - its pretty cool how lush they look now compared).                                               

Spinach, with eggplant and onions around the side.

  

Memorial Day - the plants are all in

I'm going to try to hold back on minute-by-minute updates on the gardening front, but, having no kids, I feel like a new parent - I want to document every first shoot, bud, weed and caterpillar that I find in the garden. But this big news this weekend is that everything is in the ground! Hooray! The first year we planted, I think we put the tomatoes in in April - and they did fine. But with frost warnings this year well into May, we held off on the tenderest stuff: our eggplant, cantaloupe, tomatoes and peppers. I want those plants to produce stuff all summer long, so I'm willing to wait an extra week if it means they'll be healthier in the long run. Plus, I've noticed that even if you plant most things early, they'll stay pretty sluggish until they get the weather they want - then they take off like a rocket!

So here's the update: The earliest stuff is doing pretty good - peas are about a foot and a half off the ground, the potatoes are going gangbusters and popping out the tops of all the buckets, the carrots have their first true leaves (after almost a month of trying to water them every day, the little divas!), the Romaine lettuce is at edible size, and I just harvested and ate our first radish. Year 2 of our strawberry patch is amazing - we've harvested about 50 huge, juicy strawberries - Dawn says we owe it all to the inches and inches of compost we've dumped on top. The garlic and onions are up, and the broccoli and "pak choi" look perky and growing. The eggplant already has a bloom on it!



Our raised bed out front is now fully planted, and so far the peas that we put out front, on the south side of our house, are now fully twice as tall as the ones in the cooler, shadier back yard. Nothing really beats full sun, I guess. But I've been trying to work with our microclimate: the sun-loving squashes, tomatoes and peppers are in the sun-baked raised bed out front. The shade-tolerant lettuce and cucumbers are in the partially-shaded areas of the back, and the cool-loving broccoli an pak choi are in an area that receives a little bit of shade. After three years, I now know when to give up - the back corners of our garden, where I have tried to plant beans, sunflowers, tomatoes and potatoes - all to no avail. Now that area is allowed to have just weeds and flowers - a good place for beneficial insects to hang out and feels safe.



I've also tried to tone down my "companion planting" - after three years, I have a better idea of, timing-wise, which plants go together. (Usually I just plant too much stuff on top of each other, and nothing has enough space!) I planted my lettuce close to the base of my eggplant - by the time the eggplant reaches it's full two-foot spread, the lettuce will already be in our salad bowl. I planted cucumbers at the bottom of the pea plants - hopefully by the time the cukes are ready to run up the vertical-support strings, the peas will be done....but every year I miscalculate how late in the season we can harvest peas, so we'll have to see how it goes. And I planted some of my favorite "dragon bean" seeds in between the pak choi - hopefully by the time the beans need more space, we can start stir-frying the Asian greens.



But yesterday I set up my bean tepee for the pole beans to grow up, and Dawn and I hooked up our front-yard soaker hose (expensive, and a small feat of engineering, but simplifies our lives) - we're pretty much ready to go for the summer! yeah, bring on the hot days! (Now all I need is some mulch to keep all that good water with my plants!)